


Principles of Original Order

by AlexStone



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Elven Architecture, Fantasy Archive, Insomnia, Library, M/M, Nightmares, This is why Gandalf was allowed a Candle in the Minis Tirith Archives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:42:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26530846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexStone/pseuds/AlexStone
Summary: Frodo spots something strange in Rivendell, and it leads him on a night time adventure. Archives, wizards, and back passages galore.
Relationships: Frodo Baggins & Gandalf | Mithrandir, Frodo Baggins/Sam Gamgee
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	Principles of Original Order

Frodo was not sleeping again.

Rivendell nights were warmer than the Shire. Even at night a humidity spread through the valley, penetrating dreams of hooded figures on mountain tops. On those nights, like this night, Frodo lay awake and gazed into the open eye of the moon. Sam slept deeply beside him, spread starfish across the elven bed.

Frodo had not slept a full night since Weathertop.

He did not wake because of the wound. That pain, sharp and ice-cold, was constant as to be unremarkable now. Not that it did not hurt; instead that, even now, Frodo knew that this pain would follow him every day of his life. Frodo learned to live for the moments between pain. Pippin scolded by the elves for stealing kitchen herbs. Merry’s planting kitchen herbs in Pippin’s jacket. Sam.

Frodo did not even wake because of the nightmares. The reaching hands, the hooded figures, and underneath, a hunger that burned the soul out of you. It was the thing that came after the nightmares. The silence. The darkness. It was as if all the light in the world had been extinguished. Frodo would lie in that darkness for hours, knowing what was coming next. The darkness, deep as a mountain, would begin to move. Frodo would feel a terrible truth that would cause him to wake with a start.

Something was in the darkness with him.

Each night he awoke stifling a scream. Each night sweat beaded on his forehead, his heart fit to burst from his chest. This night was like all the others.

“I’m safe. I’m loved. Nothing can hurt me here.”

Strider had taught Frodo this mantra after witnessing one of his nightmares. _“I can’t have you giving us away,”_ the ranger echoed in Frodo’s memory.

“I’m safe.”

Frodo looked over to Sam, who was gently snoring.

“I’m loved.”

Frodo reached out and curled his hand into Sam’s outstretched palm. His hands were rough from years of hard work.

“Nothing can hurt me here.”

Frodo flopped onto his back. Sleep was completely off the cards. His gaze floated towards the ceiling, tracing the shifting lines and patterns. The elven rooms had a peculiar unity to them, a complete purpose that seemed to grow from a single point. The lines on the ceiling seemed to arc like the grain of a singular piece of wood, all in a single direction.

Except for one.

Frodo frowned, and sat up in the bed. There was a single line that ran perpendicular to the others. Frodo rubbed his eyes, wondering if this was a trick of the light. The rebel line was unmistakeable. A cloud parted overhead, and the room filled with soft moonlight. The line twinkled golden. Frodo tucked the sheets beneath him, and stood on the bed. He reached his hand towards the line, tracing its direction towards the hallway.

Frodo slid off the bed, pausing when Sam stopped snoring. Frodo felt the silence gather in the top of his chest. Finally Sam rolled over and began snoring again, this time face down in a pillow. Frodo felt his breath relax. He loved that hobbit in a way that made him dizzy.

Gathering a shawl to wrap around himself, Frodo stepped out into the corridor. He was a Baggins after all, and no Baggins ever denied a mystery.

The corridors of Rivendell had an intuitive elegance to them. Frodo felt as if he was walking through a forest. Wandering the corridors, Frodo realised that this was only part of the truth. Rivendell was not modelled after a tree. It was a tree. Frodo reached his hand to the wall, and felt the wooden grain under his fingers. Closing his eyes, he traced his finger along the edge of the wall as he walked the length of the corridor. A single, uninterrupted line. Each part growing into the next.

Frodo wondered at the creativity behind this design. Hobbit dwellings were so haphazard, generations living in the holes of previous generations, each one carving their space into the world. Rivendell left no space for alteration. It had one singular design, one perfect execution, with no possibility for change.

Again, a small glimmer of gold on the floor caught Frodo’s eye. He crouched down to examine it. On closer examination, it looked like a single vein of gold, running parallel to the wooden grain. There was no doubt that it was the same line from before. Frodo looked forward and backward down the length of the corridor.

Frodo felt a thrill of excitement run through his body. He remembered being a young hobbit in Bag-End, sneaking into Bilbo’s study and looking for Dwarven pipes. He remembered Bilbo’s laughter as he caught Frodo red-handed, before the elder hobbit revealed that he had pinched Bodelia Sacksville-Baggins’ silver spoon.

The golden line led him the length of several corridors, past a threatening mural and a statue hold a broken sword. It suddenly swerved right, and entered a part of Rivendell Frodo had never been before. Frodo gazed upward, and saw the elven script above the entrance.

_Archive._

Frodo took a tentative step inside. The archive seemed to be in a lower level of Rivendell, as Frodo could hear rushing water close by. The entranceway opened up into a large, domed chamber. A thick pillar sat at the centre of the chamber, with a spiral staircase arcing around it and leading to an upper balcony. This balcony branched off into walkways and alcoves, leading to dark recesses with rows upon rows of shelves. In a sense, Frodo realised, the archive was a tree within the larger tree of Rivendell.

Frodo felt a sudden twinge of apprehension. Hobbiton was not known for its libraries or archives. In fact, Bilbo’s collection of books and Dwarven manuscripts may well have been the largest in all of the Shire. Frodo remembered how Bilbo had hauled Pippin out of his study, berating him for eating biscuits over a map of the Misty Mountain.

Another voice echoed in Frodo’s mind. He had read about the scribes of men, who wrote down the records and actions of kings and diplomats. He had read of the elven manuscripts, set down when the first elves travelled from Valinor. He had read about Easterling histories, carved on Oliphant tusks and housed in enormous halls. He had read so much about history, dreamed about being a part of it.

Frodo took some further steps into chamber, his eyes adjusting to the darkness. To his right was a small desk with carefully placed sign. The sign was in Elvish, but a hurried hand had translated it into common:

_All Readers to Register with Archivist_

_Absolutely no Fires, Food, or Foolery_

_No Exceptions_

Several of the words in common had been underlined multiple times. Frodo looked behind the desk, and saw a series of carefully arranged papers. There were a series of hooks, each with an arrangement of keys on them. Frodo frowned at one hook, which was conspicuously empty.

Frodo stepped away from the desk, and walked into the archive. The ground floor had a sparse collection of large tables, each one meticulously cleaned. Some of the tables had carefully stacked wooden boxes, with notes against them. Frodo suspected that the notes must be the names of archive readers.

Frodo approached one of the boxes, not recognising the name. A pair of bronze clasps sealed the box on one side. Frodo carefully opened it, surprised to hear small _hiss_ of air entering the box as it opened. Inside was a series of parchment letters. The script was undeniably a form of elvish, but the form and handwriting was unlike anything Frodo had seen before. A small supplemental note was nestled into the inside of the box. _‘Letters between the Elrond Peredhel and the Lady Galadriel on the alliance of men and elves, Second Age.’_

Frodo almost jumped out of his skin. These frail objects were thousands of years old, concerning a moment in history every being in Middle Earth knew about. He hurriedly packed the letters away, and closed the box. Frodo half expected Elrond to storm out of the shadows, and berate him for his foolishness.

When silence fell, and Frodo’s heart stopped hammering against his chest, he turned to look at the full scope of the archive. Each corner, each shelve, each box held objects older than the Shire itself.

In that moment, something in Frodo felt very small.

Frodo stepped onto the upper level of the archives. From there, Frodo had a better sense of the placement of the archives within Rivendell. With a bolt of delight he realised that the waterfall must be directly beneath the archives, the rushing cold water keeping the room cool at all times. Frodo inhaled the soft scent of fresh water on running stones. The aromas of parchment, vellum, and pipe-weed.

_Pipe-weed?_

Frodo turned with a start. A hunched figure sat in one of the farthest branches of the archive. A single candle illuminated the figure from below, from an angle that Frodo couldn’t have seen from the central stairwell. Frodo did not know many elves with a taste for Brandybuck pipe-weed, and he felt a smile creep upon his lips. Gandalf. This could be fun.

He crouched, and began to make his way towards the wizard’s branch. The waterfall provided ambient cover for his footsteps, and he was confident that not even Strider could hear his approach. There was a slight air draught that flowed towards Frodo, so there was no chance of the wizard smelling his approach.

A thought crossed Frodo’s mind. He had a terrific advantage to surprise the wizard. But what if he could be certain? What if he could be even more clever, even more cunning? What if he used everything at his disposal to get the better of Gandalf, _and surely he should be better than Gandalf._ In a brief moment, a cloud shifted and the moon shone into the archive. Frodo felt his eyes being drawn upward, to look at the moon, which for the briefest moment looked like the white of an enormous eye.

“Not many hobbits have the talent to trick a wizard,” Gandalf declared, “and even fewer have the courage to succeed.”

Frodo felt his mind slam back into his body. In a moment of confusion, he found his left hand clasped around the ring that hung from his neck. No, not clasped, prying. Gandalf had not turned from his seat. Frodo took a step forward, with a feeling similar to being dragged in front of Bilbo after covering for Sam breaking one of the antique dwarves plates.

“I did not take you for a nocturnal sleuth, my dear Frodo,” Gandalf asked, his eyes shining in the candlelight, “Perhaps I should commend Strider for passing such talents on to yourself.”

“I’m sorry, Gandalf,” Frodo murmured, a sense of embarrassment creeping across his face, “I couldn’t sleep, and I didn’t meant to disturb you.”

“It is not your night time wanderings that disturb me,” Gandalf said, equal parts to Frodo as to himself. A silence passed, and Frodo felt as if the wizard was considering many different possibilities. Gandalf punctuated the silence, gesturing to the bench he was sat upon, “Care to join me?”

Relieved that his mistakes were no longer the subject of attention, Frodo climbed onto the bench with Gandalf. With the light of the candle, Frodo could see the table littered with manuscripts and maps, stacked with varying degrees of precarity. The wizard seemed to be examining several different maps and letters.

“Bilbo used to sit with me in here,” Gandalf mused, chewing the end of his pipe, “I am indebted to the Baggins’ capacity to find missing things.”

“What things did you and Bilbo look at?” Frodo asked. Speaking with Gandalf felt like having three different conversations, all at the same time.

“Oh, much the same as now,” Gandalf smiled, “We needed some help with a rather tricky map, but the rest was rather prosaic. Bilbo has quite the mind for letters, you know. Have you had a chance to read his book?”

“I’ve been given drafts,” Frodo explained, “Bilbo was so scared that you would be offended at how he described you.”

“Oh?” Gandalf turned, his thick eyebrows arched in interest, “and how did Bilbo describe me?”

“He… well…” Frodo stammered, feeling his mouth go dry, “he said you were ‘a little old man, with a pointed blue hat.’ But that was an early draft…”

“Blue?” Gandalf exclaimed in what Frodo hoped was feigned annoyance, “Blue? I’m surprised that hobbit lasted a day in Erebor, since he is obviously blind to anything further than his fists!”

There was a pause between the two. Gandalf broke the tension with a heartfelt chuckle, which Frodo nervously joined. Gandalf sighed, and turned back to the papers on the table in front of him. Frodo looked at the map closest to him. It looked like the plan of a Dwarven mine. _Khazad-Dûm,_ Frodo translated, struggling with the Dwarven runes. The mine seemed enormous, stretching downwards into the mountain.

“Are you planning on going here, Gandalf?” Frodo asked.

The wizard did not look up, engrossed in a thick leather-bound tome. He seemed to be mouthing the words under his breath, and Frodo realised he must be translating the script. He looked over at the book, and saw an illustration on the far page of a dark figure, shrouded in flames.

“No, I shall not be going here,” Gandalf declared, quickly closing the book, “You should hope you too have no reason to visit that place. However, this does raise a peculiar question in regards to a route…”

The wizard reached out and rearranged the papers, seeming to compare the maps together. Frodo felt a bubble of anxiety in his chest. There were so many unanswered questions that had followed him since the Shire, questions that he had not had the time to ask Gandalf. Strider was good for one word answers, and Merry could muse for hours on the injustices of the world. Still something sat in the back of Frodo’s mind. A fear that something great and awful was coming, and only a veil of time separated them.

“Gandalf, can I ask you something?” Frodo felt the weight of days, weeks of questions building up inside of him.

“I do not doubt your talents of query, Frodo, yet I suppose that you will ask me regardless,” Gandalf replied.

“I… well. I wanted to ask you,” Frodo stammered. For all the moments he had practiced with Sam, for all the times he had rehearsed it travelling with Strider, it was all coming down to this moment. “I wanted to ask you…”

_But what if he doesn’t know?_

“Why do you have a candle?” Frodo blurted out.

Gandalf turned his head slightly, a look of rare and genuine confusion crossing his face.

“The um. The sign at the entrance. It says that there shouldn’t be any fire in the archives. At all.” Frodo sighed. _Stupid._

Gandalf said nothing for a moment. Then, with a deft flick of his wrist he knocked the candlestick over. Frodo leapt from the bench and attempted to pull the manuscripts from the flame, but it was too late. Hungry fire was beginning to spread across the desk, over the parchment, consuming them, and…

Leaving them completely undamaged?

Frodo turned in amazement to Gandalf. In the darkness, the wizard’s eyes were like the night on a midsummer’s eve. Fire crackled across the table, and Frodo suddenly noticed that the flames hovered just above the records. It was imperceptible at first, but a thin layer a shimmering amber separated the fire from its prey. Gandalf raised his hands, and began to massage the flames, rolling them in a way that Frodo had seen Sam knead sourdough.

After massaging the flames into a single spark, Gandalf gently guided it back to the candle wick. Frodo noticed the ring on Gandalf’s right hand, and the red gemstone that shone like burnished bronze. With a suddenness that surprised him, Frodo felt that heat in the ring at his chest, and an prideful rage at being reduced to a child’s play-thing.

“You would not believe the trouble this has gotten me into,” Gandalf chuckled, “the head archivist at Minis Tirith still hasn’t forgiven me leaving an apple core on the third stack _._ Mice got scent of it, and promptly chewed through three volumes of Arthedain correspondence.”

“You’ve been to the archives at Minis Tirith?” Frodo gasped, all previous misgivings forgotten.

“Why yes, Frodo,” Gandalf said, “In fact, I travelled there in the time between our meetings in the Shire. Their collections are quite expansive.”

“I’ve heard they have one of the first manuscripts of _Tuor and Idril,”_ Frodo vibrated with excitement, “I’ve only heard it described, but apparently if you hold the pages to the setting sun it shows…”

“… The Twin Trees of Valinor,” Gandalf finished Frodo’s sentence simultaneously. Both of them laughed. A mischievous look passed across Gandalf’s face. “What if I was to tell you,” he leaned towards Frodo conspiratorially, “that one is a fake.”

“What?” Frodo exclaimed, “No! It can’t… really?”

Gandalf stood from the desk, the look of mischief now involved into a mask of mayhem. “Follow me,” he said, walking towards the stacks.

Frodo followed closely. He felt as if he was breaking several rules of good hospitality. Is that what Pippin felt every day?

“Elrond always resented that the Minis Tirith archives had acquired _The Twin Trees Manuscript,_ ” Gandalf explained, leading Frodo deeper into the archive stacks, “I’m not entirely certain how it ended up with the Gondorian’s myself. Elrond spent generations on a campaign of letters with the head archivists of Minis Tirith, petitioning them to return it to Rivendell. It reached such a boiling point that Ecthelion II was involved.”

“I can’t imagine saying no to Elrond,” Frodo said, darting behind the wizard’s cloak.

“Of all the races of this world, Frodo, I have never encountered one more stubborn than an archivist,” Gandalf laughed at his own joke, “Ecthelion had the manuscript delivered to Rivendell on two conditions. The first was that a replica would be made for Gondor, and that no one would be told about the forgery. The Minis Tirith archives losing a crown jewel to the elves would be blow to several generations of professional pride.”

They had arrived at a hanging tapestry of the Lady Arwen. Even in the darkness Frodo felt a knot in his throat at her beauty. It was the same knot that he felt when he looked at a Sam.

Suddenly, Frodo realised that the golden vein had followed underneath his feet, and was leading directly into the tapestry. It was joined by others, almost a dozen, each one reaching back into the many corridors and halls of Rivendell, but converging on this single point.

Gandalf gently moved the tapestry aside, revealing anarrow door. Looking back at Frodo, the wizard raised a finger to his lips and produced a small wooden key from the folds of his cloak. He carefully unlocked the door, and gestured inside.

“What was the second condition?” Frodo asked, stepping past Gandalf into the darkness.

The wizard followed Frodo, and murmured a quiet spell. A single flame burst into life, and flew to a chandelier. Frodo felt his eyes sting at the new light, and he raised his hand to cover them.

“The second condition,” Gandalf marvelled, “was to treat it with the care it deserved.”

Frodo lowered his hand, and felt his jaw hit the floor.

They had entered a small room, barely big enough for a three men. The room was carved with the same wood as Rivendell, but inlayed with fire. No, not fire, gold. Frodo rubbed his eyes. The golden veins swarmed across the floor, converging on a single point. There, a golden pedestal was raised from the floor, almost as if it had grown out of the wood. Frodo took a gentle step forward, almost recognising the pedestal. It looked so familiar, almost natural, like a tree.

With a rush wonder, Frodo realised that this was a miniature Tree of Valinor. Nestled in its bough was a small manuscript. The binding was wood, layered with such delicacy that it looked like folded leaves. Feeling his eyes rise upwards, Frodo saw the low ceiling filled with concentric tree rings, and a single gemstone at the centre that blazed in the candlelight.

In that moment, Frodo had two simultaneous epiphanies. The first was that this room must be the core of Rivendell, a heart around which every grand room, elegant veranda, sweeping balcony, orbited with certain precision. The second was that this room may be the most beautiful room in the entire world.

“Its incredible,” Frodo whispered.

Gandalf nodded. Frodo looked up, and caught only the briefest flash of a tear in the wizard’s eye.

“Why has Elrond hidden it?” Frodo asked.

“I couldn’t say,” Gandalf spoke with a quiet tone that Frodo suspected was to stop his voice from breaking, “Sometime the greatest loves are secret.”

Frodo felt a hot flush come across him. He had kept his secret from Sam for so many years. He remembered how good it felt, to have something that only he knew about the world. He felt a sadness open up as he realised that he still enjoyed keeping secrets.

“I think I understand what that feels like,” Frodo said quietly.

“I believe you,” Gandalf said, placing a hand on Frodo’s shoulder.

For the briefest of moments, Frodo felt like everything was going to be okay.

* * *

“Master Frodo?”

Frodo stirred. The morning light was pouring through the window. Frodo lifted his hand to his eyes, peering through the brightness.

“Frodo, are you feeling okay?”

Sam was perched on end of the bed, at Frodo’s feet. His undershirt was loosely tied, revealing a soft curl of ombre chest hair. He had a look of concern on his face.

“You don’t often out-sleep me, and I was worried that you were coming down with something,” Sam reached out and held the back of his hand to Frodo’s forehead, “it could be the food, I know Pippin snuck into the kitchens last night. Oh, if he’s done something to your stomach Mr Frodo, I’ll…”

“Sam, it’s okay,” Frodo reached out and held Sam’s hand, “I just overslept.”

“See, that’s the issue, in all the time we’ve travelled you’ve never overslept. I remember my Gaffer’s great-aunt Margerie, lived in Bree, she was perfectly healthy all her life, and then one day she overslept and got confused, and then she tripped over a cat, and fell head first onto a horse-shoe, and popped her head like a grape against her front step.”

“Sam, I swear on Bilbo’s favourite tea-set I’m not going to trip over a cat,” Frodo laughed, “I haven’t even seen a cat in Rivendell.”

“I’m sorry Frodo,” Sam blushed. He was so beautiful when he blushed. “I just worry about you, is all.”

Frodo shuffled along the bed, and took Sam’s head in his hands. “I love you so much, Sam Gamgee,” he said.

The morning sun illuminated their kiss, just as it did the halls and towers of Rivendell. Water spray danced and echoed across the canyon. The future, and all its infinite possibilities, melted away, like a good dream after a long and dark night. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you nonbinaryhamlet for beta reading this fic! This is my first return to fan fiction writing after... well, a while. There will be more to come. I hope you enjoyed it! Please let me know what you think. I can be found on Twitter at @alexstonewriter


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